‘Yugong Yishan’ auctioned for 33m yuan – Gu Jia

From Shanghai Daily:

Chinese artist Xu Beihong‘s early draft of “Yugong Yishan” was auctioned off for 33 million yuan (US$4.13 million) to a mainland collector yesterday in Beijing, setting a record high for an oil painting in China’s auction history, Xinhua news agency reported today.

The draft was produced in 1940 during Xu’s stay in India, but was hidden in an abandoned well of an outlying township’s school in Singapore with hundreds of his other works during World War II. After spending the last 60 years overseas, the master piece will soon be displayed on the mainland.